How to help your child through anxiety, with Karen Young from Hey Sigmund

Do you want your children to be more resilient? More brave? To not shy away from new situations? Kids are mighty, and they need to believe that they are too! Anxiety is a really normal human experience, and learning how to manage anxiety can strengthen children and teens to become courageous and resilient. In this episode of The Parenting Couch podcast, Karen Young from Hey Sigmund talks through how to help your child through anxiety.

In the latest episode of The Parenting Couch podcast, Rachel and Sarah talk to Karen Young about:

• Why anxiety isn’t a bad thing, and why we need anxiety to grow as a human
• Why it’s normal (and good!) that an anxious child can create anxiety in the parent
• Shares top tips for how you, as a parent, can support your child through anxiety
• Separation anxiety! Understand why clinginess happens, and how to stop it from holding your child
• How to stop anxiety stealing sleep in Kids and Teens

About Karen Young

Karen Young began her career as a psychologist and now consults with parents, schools, government bodies, and child and adolescent focused organisations both at home in Australia and overseas.

She is the founder of Hey Sigmund, an internationally popular online resource that provides contemporary, research-driven information on anxiety, parenting, and the neurodevelopment of children. She has written three books, including the bestselling Hey Warrior. The books have been translated into multiple languages and are used extensively in homes, schools, and therapeutic settings throughout the world.

Karen also a mum to two children and two stepchildren. Experience has taught her that people can do amazing things with the right information, psychology has something for everyone, jargon doesn’t, everyone has a story to tell, short bios are the longest to write, nobody has it all figured out and the best people to be around are the ones who already know this.

Books by Karen Young

Dear You, Love From Your Brain: Like all strong, beautiful, important things, brains take time to build. Along the way, children have an enormous capacity to influence the brain-building process in profound and enduring ways. First though, they need information that will help them perform their magic. This book will help children discover more about the brain – how it works, what it needs, and how to love it big so it loves them bigger. Buy on Booktopia.

Hey Warrior: Kids can do amazing things with the right information. Understanding why anxiety feels the way it does and where the physical symptoms come from is a powerful step in turning anxiety around. Anxiety explained, kids empowered. Buy on Booktopia.

Hey Awesome: If kids with anxiety could see their strengths, they would feel so much bigger than their anxiety. They would feel bigger than everything – as though a tiny, tip-toed stretch could have them touching the top of the world from where they are. This book is a reminder for all kids that everything they need to be brave, strong and brilliant is already in them. Buy on Booktopia.

Support Services

• Lifeline (Crisis support and suicide prevention): 13 11 14
• Beyond Blue: 1300 22 46 36
• Mensline: 1300 78 99 78

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Transcript

Welcome to The Parenting Couch with Rachel Chappell and Sarah Levett.
Honest conversations about what parenting is really like. Because let's be real, it can be hard. 
Proudly brought to you by North Shore Mums.

Sarah Levett  0:20  
Hi, and welcome to The Parenting Couch. I'm Sarah Levett, former brekky radio host and also mum, single mum to a daughter aged nine. Wow!

Rachel Chappell  0:34  
Crazy.  And I'm Rachel Chappell, the Founder of North Shore Mums, and also a mum to three daughters aged 7, 10 and 12.

Sarah Levett 0:50  
This week, we have Karen Young psychologist joining us from Hey Sigmund! And Rachel and I've really been looking forward to this particular interview because we've been enjoying the website all resources and particularly the videos. Amazing content. 

Rachel Chappell  1:05  
Amazing content. I love reading the articles, but it's the videos. You're amazing. You just like would talk to camera for 15 minutes straight without a single um or ah? I'm like, WOW, this lady is amazing. 

Sarah Levett
Do you have notes? Like do you have an like a prompter for when you do your videos?

Karen Young 1:26  
No, I just know. What you don't see is the 15th recordings that came before.

Rachel Chappell  1:36  
But it's still in one take though. take most of them and the ones that I've seen. You're just talking, get all your points across, they're it's fantastic.

Sarah Levett 1:45  
Obviously, you know, you've been doing what you do for a long time starting out as a psychologist in private practice. Is that right? So that's how you began your career.

Karen Young  1:54  
Yeah. So that's how I began. And then I stopped for a little while to have a family. And then I went back into it. And I started the website, because I just wanted everybody to be able to access the information. And I know when I was in private practice, I'd work with a lot of people and I'd say, you know, it's actually what's happening out there, that's going to make you stronger, and heal and grow. It's that 45 minutes with me, it's those sessions are important, but they're not the full picture. So I think the support needs to come in other ways as well. So that's why I started the website. And now I'm not in practice anymore. What I do is I go around and consultant talking that sort of thing.

Rachel Chappell  2:38  
Yeah, so how do you spend most of your days? Is it going out to schools? Or is it doing like online webinars?

Karen Young  2:44  
It's all of that. I go to schools, I do professional development seminars, I consult doing a lot of Early Learning Centres work my days, you know, they're all? Yeah.

Sarah Levett  3:01  
What do you love more about the difference between doing the private practice work now to being a consultant and having the website and that online resources.

Karen Young  3:13  
I mean, there were things I loved about about both of them, I think what I really love now is being able to really put the power and the strategies in the hands of parents and teachers, because they're actually the adults on the front line. It's not me, I'm not there, when a child is really anxious. It's their parents and, or their teachers or their grandparents or there other important people. And what I really love is being able to get in there and, and, and build the support for kids this way. So I suppose the reach, you know, we widen the network a little bit.  I really love that. And even when I was working with kids, you know, I think so much. You can affect so much change when they're important adults actually have the information we've had with what to do and how to respond because anxiety, especially something like anxiety can be ruthless. And I had one of my children had big anxiety, and I know about this stuff, but as a parent... it's it's completely different, the whole game changes. And so that was also really been motivated with I thought, well, if I'm struggling to deal with this, I can I can work with other people's kids.

Rachel Chappell  4:33  
Because we need to know what to do when that particular situation arises. And you're there and this particular things happening. And I guess, knowing what strategies to use to help the children manage their anxiety. And if the parent doesn't know, then the child's not going to know so the parent needs to know as well.

Karen Young 4:50  
That's it. And I think, you know, it's those it's those every one of the things I say is it's the everyday interactions with their important people that make the difference and And for sure, therapy and sessions with a psychologist or a counsellor can be hugely beneficial, definitely. But it never stops at at the door, it has to keep going outside. And so, even when I would do work with children, a really important part of that was also supporting parents to be change-makers, as well.

Sarah Levett 5:23  
I find as a parent, I have a nine year old. And through that time, I went through a separation, which meant I had to really go into the trenches. And I've decided to do a lot of work on myself at the same time, because I thought, well, there's an opportunity to become a better person, better parent, more patient for my daughter, and also understanding my own anxiety, and then to be able to help her anxiety. And she did go through quite an anxious stage during that period. I mean, not everyone is willing to do therapy as an adult as a parent. So how do you manage that? No, I mean, because really, I'm sure that so much of it is the work of the parents to then be able to benefit the children.

Karen Young 6:01  
The thing about anxiety and children, is that it takes up parents as well, it takes up everybody. So when anxiety hits a child or an adolescent, it doesn't just hit them. It also it pulls in their important people, that's what it's actually meant to do. So anxiety in a young person creates anxiety in their important adults. That's a really important part of actually making sure they get the support they need. So that's not about breakage. That's really important. So we feel their distress. That's how it's meant to be. But in response to that distress, sometimes we can do things that actually, rather than so rather than building them up against anxiety, we can inadvertently maintain anxiety and maintain the fear. So if we pull them away from something that is safe, but still scary, like going to school, or like facing a challenge, or doing something new, anxiety happens in response to all of those things. If we pull them away from that they're actually not getting those really important experiences, they need to learn that they can actually do hard things, and that even when things feel scary, they're actually really capable, they can do them. Because whenever we push up against our edges, we're going to have anxiety, every single person. 

One of the things that concerns me at the moment is the pathologising of anxiety. We're all going to get anxious, when we do have things that's what makes them hard. It's also what makes them brave. But for sure, anxiety can be really, really intrusive. But as they're important adults, we need to sometimes help them tell the difference between scary safe things, and scary dangerous things. And of course, we pull them away from the scary dangerous, we protect them. But if it's scary safe, one of the one of our really important jobs, because this is how resilience happens is okay, how can you take a little step towards that you don't have to do it all at once. We're not going to throw them in the deep end. But what's one little step you can do? Can you try it for five minutes? Can you try it for 10 minutes, or can we just sit on the sidelines and watch for a little while and then next time we'll go forward, rather than pulling them back.

Rachel Chappell  8:12  
In the North Shore Mums Facebook group, we see posts all the time from parents, you know, concerned about the anxiety in their child, and it can come in so many different forms. So you know, with separation anxiety, dropping them off at childcare, or that kind of clinginess, through to I guess sleeping, going to sleep at night and not wanting to sleep in their own bed or not being able to go to sleep with the light off and stuff. So it'd be would be really interesting to talk about, I guess, specific examples of how we could deal with it. So for example, with the childcare drop off, and you've got this child that is, you know, clinging and really sad about mum going, what can we do as parents to support them through that transition?

Karen Young  8:56  
So the first thing we have to recognise is that's really developmentally appropriate, that is not about them not being brave enough or strong enough. So separation anxiety exists for a really good reason, it helps to make sure they stay close to us, because if kids didn't have separation anxiety, they're just been wandering off everywhere, and some people do anyway. It also exists in parents, because if we truly don't know where our kids are, it's terrifying. And that makes us restore our physical closeness back to them because it's not safe for kids to be just wandering out on their own if they're not claimed by an adult. If an adult truly doesn't know where they are. So we have to not pathologise it. The problem is whenever there's that felt separation from a parent, what we want to do is, is fill that gap as much as we can with another adult who can fulfil that role of loving them and leading them so it has to be two things. 

So the first thing we want to do is really facilitate the relationship with whoever is the important adult who's receiving them. And we also want to make sure we give a really quick, confident goodbye. Because as long as we're there, that brains fighting for us to stay, so it keeps them in distress. Once you leave that brain goes "Okay, well, you've gone, I may as well get on with it". And it actually does they get on with it, we know they get on with it. So we want to bring that brain and body back to rest as much as possible. But it is important that they have another adult there who can love and lead them that they feel safely. So it's not enough just to have an adult in the room. Because, you know, just because there's an adult doesn't mean they're going to feel safe and loved by them. So we want to facilitate that relationship with the carer, as much as possible.

Rachel Chappell  10:50  
You often hear that you've dropped your child off, and they're crying, and they're really upset. And the childcare educator, they'll say, "Oh, the minute you left, they were fine. They stopped crying straightaway". And then meanwhile, you've gone on and for the next half hour just felt awful, and so guilty that you've left your child ,and you're worrying about them. So what can we do as parents to feel better about that experience of babies? It's It's tricky, isn't it? It's like, because we've we're upset by it, too. It's not just the child that's upset, we get upset.

Karen Young  11:20  
Yeah. And I've been there, I tell you. But we it's excruciating, isn't it? It's one of the worst things, because as a parent, one of the worst things is feeling that separation from your child. So the first thing we have to do is recognise this is really normal. It's how it's meant to happen. Because if we get that sense, if when we're separate from them,  when we're actually separated from them. If they aren't safe, we want that anxiety, we want that anxiety in us, because that's going to make sure that we go and seek them out and do whatever we need to do to get back close to them so we can keep them safe. The bit we need to recognise is the brain actually can't tell the difference. So again, that's a scary safe one. Scary dangerous, is if they are separated from us, and there isn't another important person there who loves them, and who can lead them. The brain can't tell the difference. So our brains going to as soon as they're distressed, our brain is going to feel the distress of that. So we need to actually remind ourselves that, that this anxiety we feel, and the distress we feel, we're actually picking up their distress, that's that's meant to happen. And that's really normal. And that's a really healthy thing. But this time when it's happening, they're actually safe. And, they're okay,

Sarah Levett  12:42  
But it's so hard. Like you just said, then I can I remember that feeling with my first (and my only at this stage) daughter, you know that too. And, and I remember reading about it looking for strategies. And you know, everything I read said, have a little routine. And once we put your bag down, and that's when I'm gonna go. So do all of that. And it still was touching go depending on the day, and obviously, I would leave and feel that exact feeling. But I'm quite sure that I was feeding anxiety back to her as well, a chicken or the egg? I don't really know. Because you know that as much as I was trying to be calm and put those strategies into place and follow that, you know, I'm quite sure that every time there was that 'agh!' feeling, leaving

Karen Young  13:30  
Exactly. And what I want to say to that for parents listening is parents don't cause anxiety. So so what you feel when you feel that anxiety in response to your children's anxiety, that's a response, not a cause of anxiety will feed back into it. So yeah, if we're anxious, and they feel as anxious because they're looking to us for signs of... Do you think I'm okay, here? Do you think I'm safe here? And if we're anxious, and they'll pick it up really easily, we feed back into them and into their nervous systems and and they do get, they will get anxious from that. But it's a response to their anxiety. So they get anxious, they create that anxiety in us, we then feed it back into them they feed it back into so it's a bit of a loop. 

So our capacity to actually regulate ourselves and have that calm, strong steady presence "fake it to you to be it", is actually going to short circuit their anxiety. But it's not just about telling them to get on with it. We have to actually catch it so we have to validate it and say "It's so hard saying goodbye to Mummy, isn't it? I I hate saying goodbye to you too. And I know you're going to be so fine here with Miss Sophie who's going to take really good care of you" and then focus them back on the connection. "I can't wait to see you this afternoon and hear all about your day". 

So what she's they're picking up in you is "well mum's okay to leave me here. And mum thinks Miss Sophie is going to take really good care of me. So I'm actually going to back that in because if she believes that she wouldn't leave me here with someone she wouldn't trust." It doesn't mean that's going to be the vibe, you get straight away. It's not like they switch it off and go, "Oh, crikey, shoot, it just said that me". 

The brain actually needs evidence of that. So the brain only learns from experience. So they're going to need lots of experiences. So you might have lots and lots of sad goodbyes, you might have 100 Sad goodbyes before you have a good one. But that's okay. Their distress won't hurt them feeling alone in their distress will hurt them. That's why that relationship is really important. And having another adult who can love and lead them is really important. And I want to add that loving part is so, so important. They need to feel loved by them. And they also need to feel like that adult can handle everything that that happens during the day with them, that they're okay, they're safe. So we really need to respond with a sense of confidence, as well as validation.

Rachel Chappell  16:15  
I think that that goodbye is very important as well. Like I had a friend who used to drop their child, wait till they were distracted and then go, "Oh, they're fine". And they'll disappear without actually saying goodbye. And I was like, I can't I can't do that. Like what happens when they realise that mummy is not there? It's like, I'll just go well, they're not. Yeah, I don't think I was like, I don't think that's a good strategy.

Karen Young  16:42  
Because and what it might be okay for today. But what about tomorrow? And what about when it's a different situation, we're much better off coming at it and saying, "Okay, give me a cuddle, give them a quick, confident goodbye. I love you. I can't wait, Miss Sophie is going to take really good care of you today, I can't wait to see you this afternoon", and then go. Or if it's an older child, "Miss Brennan's going to take good care of you, I'll see you this afternoon love". And then and then leave in a really confident way doesn't mean that it's going to ease. But at least they know, at least they know that you aren't going to leave them without telling them because otherwise, we don't want them to get insecure moving forward.

Rachel Chappell  17:33  
just a little observation. But I've got I've got children, I've got a daughter who's 6, 10 and 12. And I really noticed, when my youngest started school last year, she'd been through that whole 2020 of COVID. And it was her last year of childcare. And all of a sudden, we were going from walking in and giving them their bag to only dropping the gate of childcare. And it was a much, much quicker goodbye. And, you know, they went in one by one, there was a very strict process. And she all of a sudden was brilliant at saying goodbye too, because there was that very quick process. And I also found that when she started school the following year, kindy last year, again, we weren't allowed on the school grounds. So it was a drop off at the gate and the teacher was there. And I just noticed across the board, the children actually seemed a lot easier and better at separating from their parent at the gate. And I think because they'd had those processes in place with childcare, and actually, you know, I could just see compared to what had happened with my older children. That whole starting kindy thing it was just because they'd got it right or, you know, because we're forced to do it that way.

Sarah Levett  18:48  
We didn't have a choice have a choice, and they just had to, right?

Rachel Chappell 18:54  
And it worked, like it just it actually made the separation process better for a lot of children.

Karen Young  19:02  
I'm hearing that a lot from schools, what's actually happening there, is when parents have no choice, but to go there actually, that their whole posture, your whole posture will change. It's like there's there's no choice. When we stay for a long time, we're actually sending a really subtle message that maybe you need me to stay because maybe you won't cope without me. So when we just give that quick, confident goodbye, and making sure they're received by someone who's gonna look after them. What we're saying to them is "I am so certain you're going to be safe. I'm not even worried about it. I know this is hard, and I know it's hard saying goodbye. But come and we'll have a quick cuddle. And I know you're going to be okay. I know you can cope with this".

So children experience themselves through their through their important adults. If we experience this as hard and fragile and scary, that separation, that's how they're going to experience it. If we experience the goodbye as well, this is how it is, and I'm okay with it. I know you're going to be safe. Oh, it's sad saying goodbye. And I know you're going to be okay. Then they are also going to catch that. They'll catch our anxiety and they'll catch our brave they'll do one or the other.

Sarah Levett 20:24  
I remember when my best friend who's a psychologist, she said to me, this great piece of advice, and I'm quite sure you'll agree, because it's a theme of a lot of what you've been saying. Just get secure in yourself. Because if you feel secure in yourself, then obviously now one of the other things before we wrap up today, too, is one of the videos both Rachel and I watched was three ways to stop anxiety, stealing sleeping kids and teens. Now, interestingly, through COVID, and being at home, the last lockdown my daughter, who she has been in and out of whether she slept in a bed with me after we separated, and then when she was small, she'd go to sleep on her own, but she come into my bed at night and all this sleeping stuff. And then suddenly, this really weird moment happened during the last lockdown where I said, Hey, do you want to sleep in your own bed tonight all night? She said, yep. And I went, right. Let's do it tonight. And we did it. And she did it. But she still can't get to sleep without me sitting with her. And the last time we tried, and we talked about it, because she got camp coming at the end of the year, she fell apart. I mean, like, this is me sitting on the floor and set up in the bed. Like I moved two centimetres. And she just cried and cried. And it was kind of healing. There's something cathartic about it, too. There was all this release. But she's just beside herself about that. And I'm not even leaving the room. But it she can sleep all night. And it was funny because I think being at home during COVID meant she felt safer at home and more secure. And so then she could do that. But there's this strange little thing. And I know in that video, you talked about creating a new story for kids and sleeping.

Karen Young  21:58  
So if bedtime has come to be associated with threat, and that's why they settle, we need to really rework that association. So we want bedtime to be as calm as as it can be. So have a really clear routine, around bedtime, that might mean you need to start the bedtime wind down earlier, so that they can feel connected to you and close to you. And so that bedtime can be associated with calm. One of the things you have to remember about bedtime. And sleep is it's actually the longest separation from a parent, even though you're just down the hall, what the brain registers is, yeah, but what if someone breaks in? What if her house burns down? What if... what if... what if? And there's no one here to notice? There's no one here to protect me. So that's why giving them something of yours. It might be your pillow, or it might be a shirt that smells like you or because that we can attach. It's not just our physical presence. There's other ways of doing it as well, and just reworking that whole thing. And again, pointing them to their connection in the morning. So that might be pick a story. And we're going to read that in the morning. So they'll feel you holding on to them during the night. You might say, while you're sleeping, I'm going to write your note, and I'll read it to you in the morning. And it can just be you know, you don't even writing novel novels every night, but it might just be "yesterday I loved the way you did those somersaults on the trampoline", you know, whatever it is, whatever it was, that you loved about them yesterday. And so when they go to sleep, rather than focusing on the separation from you, they're actually focusing on what's going to happen when they see you in the morning. They're focusing on the connection. They also know you're holding them in your mind, as we do anyway. But you know, they need to feel that. Because when you go back to bed, you're going to write something to me and you're going to have a have it for you. And you might say and I'm going to put it under my pillow. So it's got all my love in it. You can take it to school the next day, or something like that. But the routine the bedtime routine is really important. Having it as predictable as possible with really calming things in there to rework that association with bedtime.

Rachel Chappell  24:06  
Yeah, and I guess bedtime, you know, troubles a bedtime can vary between child and age, you know, from toddlers through to teenagers as well. Like even my 11 year old still will often get up in the night and wanting to come into our bed. I'm like it's cute on my heart. But then But then the the 10 and 6year old are fine, like it's just it's strange, but um, yeah. And also, you know, she she likes us she likes to go to sleep with the door open. And then it's only when she's 100% asleep that we're allowed to close the door. Yeah, and I don't know how to. Oh, because it's annoying because sometimes we just want to go to sleep and I'll just have got to wait till she's asleep and then we can close the door.

Karen Young  24:55  
So what's she's saying to you is "I just want to know that you've checked I'm safe". What I take it back to is remember when they were little, and we would we would check them before we went to bed that is in them as well. They just want to, they just want to know that that, that you know we're safe, for that they're coming in to check that you're still there to make sure everything's okay. 

What I say to this is, it's only a problem, if it's causing a problem, it's only a problem if it's causing a problem. But if it's not causing a problem, and everyone's okay with it. They're not going to be 16. 

But the other thing, you know, if you want it to stop, if you if you want to stop closing the door, you know, there's kind of two options here. We either wait for her to be okay with not needing the door closed. Or you say, "what I'm going to do my darling is all shut the door at nine o'clock or 10 o'clock, and whether or not you're asleep, because I actually know that you're going to be okay, I know you're going to be safe".  We focus on our behaviour and our anxiety about their anxiety. And that's eventually going to feed into there. So when she can feel the confidence in you of, well, I don't need to check that you're asleep. I know that if I'm shutting the door, I know you're safe, I know you're fine. She will take a while to get used to that, she's not going to switch off from that straightaway. But then eventually, she will rest in that. But it might take weeks... big anxiety tends to get worse before it gets better. It doesn't just switch off easily. So there's no magic switch here. It's really about well, do you want to ride this out? And wait till she gets there? Or do you want to change what you do? You can't change what she does by saying, "Alright, my love Well, I will shut the door, you know, at this time."

Sarah Levett  27:00  
Oh my goodness, so much, Karen.

Rachel Chappell  27:02  
Sarah, we've both got things that we can do tonight to solve.

Sarah Levett  27:07  
We have to wrap it up, which I really don't want to because I could listen to you talk. I love your gentle parenting style, and all just the language you use. And all of the advice, you must go on to Hey Sigmund. Because there's so many resources there, from videos, books, like all of these things. And obviously you can get Karen, personally to come to your workplace or whatever it looks like or your home or anything to help. So thank you so much for your time. Super grateful. And hopefully we can have you back on the Parenting Couch.

Rachel Chappell  27:47  
Yeah, absolutely.

Karen Young  27:49  
Thank you so much for having me and for having the conversation. I think the more we talk about it, the more we're actually we're going to be able to to feel okay with with strengthening them against it, because we're never gonna get rid of it. We don't want to get rid of it. It actually keeps us alive.  
  
But it's it's an important conversation for us to have with each other and with them. And I'm really grateful to you for opening that up. So thank you for that.

Rachel Chappell  28:27  
Lovely, thank you so much. Lovely. Thank you. Thank you.

Sarah Levett  28:33  
Wow. She is a wealth of information. And so helpful. Such great tips in there, Rachel.

Rachel Chappell 28:43  
It was I mean, we've only just covered anxiety really haven't we just did in that time. But there's so many other things that we could talk about. So hopefully we'll get to that for another for another episode soon.

Karen Young 28:57  
Yeah, no, I'm optimistic. We'll definitely get her back on but in the meantime, if you want to check out any of her videos or get in touch Karen Young at heysigmund.com

Rachel Chappell  29:07  
There's a lot of great content on her website. So many good resources for parents who've got any struggles with their child, so definitely check it out. Also, check out our socials we've on Instagram, Facebook, search the Parenting Couch podcast, or North Shore Mums, where we'll be announcing latest episodes latest guests, and be sure to subscribe or follow to the parenting couch podcast wherever you listen.

Sarah Levett  29:33  
Yeah, so if you want to be a guest on the parenting pouch podcast, you can just go to North Shore moms.com.au to the contact section there and get in touch. 

Rachel Chappell
So thanks for tuning in and we will be back in two weeks time.